


Angel Wings

by Kendrene



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Blood and Injury, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Multiple Orgasms, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Vaginal Fingering
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2018-12-22
Packaged: 2019-09-24 18:15:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17105684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kendrene/pseuds/Kendrene
Summary: When Fareeha returns to Helix Squad base after a successful mission, her armor bearing the marks of the battle she fought in, Angela is reminded of how easy it could be to lose her.Sometimes not even medical training can save the ones you love.ORAngele lets what ifs and maybe tear her apart, and Fareeha has to remind her they both are still alive.





	Angel Wings

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all!
> 
> Here's my first ever Overwatch fic. Please don't be too harsh.
> 
> \- Dren

The hardest thing for a doctor, one of her professors had told her class during medical school, was dealing with difficult patients. 

Back then - young and eager and still more than a little naive - Angela had readily believed him. And perhaps there was some truth in his statement, but, once her career path had brought her first to refugee camps around the world, then to military and strike teams, Angela had found out that the hardest thing for her was  _ waiting _ .

Of course most of the time she’d get to accompany the small strike force she was a part of - she had undergone extensive combat training for that specific reason - but on missions like the one they were currently on, where a more…  _ delicate  _ approach was necessary, she had no choice but to hang back. 

She had tried to follow other missions remotely from the command center, but that somehow made the waiting worse. Listening to the team’s audio feed - their clipped communications and the crackling sound of gunfire coming through their headsets - only managed to make Angela feel helpless. 

Useless.  

Not that sealing herself inside the infirmary until the rest of the team returned was any healthier, but at least she wasn’t forced to listen to her superiors as they pontificated about tactics and approach. 

Currently she sat in the semi-dark, all lights shut save for the emergency strip that ran along one wall. The infirmary was her domain, one that Angela could navigate with her eyes closed. She knew where everything was kept and could list the equipment down to the smallest needle. Not relying solely on computer stored inventories was for her a source of pride, and she had spent hours of downtime going over the manifests to make sure that what should be there and what effectively was, matched. 

Now, with nothing to fill her time but the roaring noise her own thoughts produced, Angela resisted the urge to go over everything again. That implied considering all that could go wrong and her mind had been down that path enough times already.

The door  _ hissed  _ open, light spilling inside from the hallway to fill Angela’s vision with dancing, white spots. 

“Lights on.” She ordered the A.I. governing the base’s systems, shaking her head as she blinked back tears. Once her vision cleared she could only stare; enclosed in her bulky armor Fareeha loomed almost threateningly as she stood just outside the door. The familiar sky blue and gold of the plates protecting her body were scorched and blackened, reminding Angela not of a proud falcon, but a far grimmer messenger. One who scoured battlefields only after blood was spilled, at the behest of a Goddess who instilled as much terror in the hearts of those that saw her as she did awe. 

Throat bobbing, Angela swallowed audibly, as she struggled to work some moisture back into a mouth that had suddenly gone dry. She seldom scared and almost never showed nerves - self-control in the face of emergencies was, after all, a fundamental requirement in her line of work - but her veins felt full of ice instead of blood.

It took her several moments to convince herself that she was indeed staring at her lover and not an apparition: one last glimpse of Fareeha before her spirit passed into the land of the dead for good. 

“I’m back.” Fareeha squeezed past the doorway, removing her helmet as she walked towards Angela. She stopped just a few paces away, right under one of the infirmary’s fluorescent lights and stilled, dark eyes never leaving Angela’s.

“So you are.” 

Up close, the damage dealt to the armor was even harder to ignore. The metal was dented in places, gauged by gunfire in others and the blue paint had been completely stripped away from most of the armor’s surface to expose the ceramic coating beneath. 

Angela could almost see the flames raging around Fareeha, yellow-orange tongues licking at the joints and riveted plates in search of a way in. She had seen soldiers cooked alive inside their suits before and it was not pretty. 

“I was not notified.” She took refuge behind dryness, unable to push those horrific images away completely. It didn’t matter that her lover was standing right in front of her, seemingly unarmed if a bit worse for wear; all that Angela could see was a grinning skull stripped of flesh where Fareeha’s face should be. 

Hands balling into fists at her sides, Angela tensed, torn between needing to breach the remaining space between them, and wanting to maintain a professional facade. Knowing that - back at base - she worried herself sick could potentially distract Fareeha from her tasks, and Angela knew from direct experience that losing focus on the field often carried a high cost.

“There was no need,” Fareeha inclined her head and her eyes glittered as they caught the light, “there are no wounded. No casualties.” She fell silent, turning her helmet in her hands and watching it reflect the overhead light. Something hung unsaid between them, but Angela had learned not to prod when Fareeha got like this.

There were always casualties - this time it so happened that none was on their side.  _ And thank the stars for that.  _

“Sit.” She said out loud, pointing Fareeha to an empty cot. “I’d still like to take a look at you.”

“I’m fine, Angela. Really.” 

_ Of course you are.  _ Black shadows gathered under Fareeha’s eyes, giving her gaze a haunted look. Her face was taut, her cheeks hollowed out by lingering tension and the  _ udjat  _ adorning her skin looked as livid as a fresh bruise under the neons’ glare. 

Angela did not argue the point out loud, choosing instead to stare Fareeha down until, after a heavy sigh, her lover conceded. 

The way she walked over to the cot, her steps so heavy they resembled a shamble, was not lost to Angela. More than likely it was nothing that a few days of rest wouldn’t fix, but she needed to make sure.

“Will you insist on checking the others over as well?” Fareeha sat down with a clank, carefully placing the helmet next to her thigh. Angela struggled to suppress a shiver; the metal right above the visor was dented and scuffed. A bullet mark. 

“None of them play down injuries the way you do.” Angela retorted, stone cold. Fear hardened her words and sharpened her temper, but the alternative was giving in to it. She wouldn’t cry in front of Fareeha, her lover had more than enough on her plate already. 

Once she was alone again then… then perhaps she could. 

Steeling herself, she shone a light into Fareeha’s eyes. “Follow the light if you please.” 

“Yes, Doctor Ziegler.” 

Angela rolled her eyes, but, as she caught the tail end of a grin on Fareeha’s lips, her expression softened. Their little exchange was just the latest part in an ongoing series. Fareeha did her best to present herself as the stalwart, indomitable leader of Helix Squad, but Angela often argued that she pushed too far. Her lover’s heart was in the right place; she cared about the men and women under her command, going as far as to contest the higher ups’ orders if she felt that losses would be unacceptable. The concern she had for her subordinates meant that she led by example, and refused to give orders that she herself was unwilling to carry out. Fareeha was the first one to get up in the morning for training, and the last to leave, which meant she didn’t rest nearly as much as she needed. 

Early on in their relationship, Angela had learned that there was not much she could do to change that attitude (short of tying her lover to their bed, which she had done a number of times), so she insisted on regular physicals.  _ Just a tad more regular for Fareeha than the rest of the squad.  _

“Angela? What’s wrong?” 

Fareeha was frowning, or rather squinting into the light and Angela realized she’d spaced out.  _ Maybe she’s not the only one that needs more rest.  _ She admitted to herself begrudgingly. 

“Nothing. Just.. Nothing.” She pocketed her penlight and offered an apologetic shrug. “Strip please.” 

“Oh Doctor, I didn’t expect you to be so…  _ forward _ .” Normally Fareeha’s banter would have eased the palpable tension between them, but Angela was too mired into  _ what ifs _ and  _ maybes _ to reciprocate. Her mind had built a perfect maze around her, and, no matter which path her thoughts took, she was faced with the most horrific of scenarios concerning not only Fareeha, but the entirety of Helix Squad. 

The same professor who had imparted the lesson about difficult patients, had also warned them about a pitfall he’d referred to as the saviour-complex.  _  Just because you have the knowledge to save lives, _ he’d said during a sleepy afternoon session with the entire class drifting toward thoughts of the coming summer,  _ doesn’t mean you will be able to. There will be times in which you’ll have to watch people die, no matter what you did or tried, and if you can’t deal with that, then you are unfit for this profession. _

That had been like pouring ice over their heads. Angela still remembered the shocked gasps that had shattered the silence and the mutterings tinged with more than a bit of outrage. 

Her gaze drifted to the far corner where her Valkyrie suit waited, wings folded and limp. 

_ Just because you dress like a guardian angel, doesn’t mean you’re one. _

Watching Fareeha shrug out of her armor and the compression suit beneath was agonizing too, not because of the act itself, but of what it revealed. Plenty of scars adorned her lover’s body; a bumpy mass of off-white tissue wrapped around one shoulder, the round, puckered dip left by a bullet over her hip bone. Angela had to stop herself from listing the rest. She knew each one intimately, some because she’d treated them directly, like the burn marks across Fareeha’s back, and those that had been there before they’d met, because she had traced them plenty of times as they laid in the same bed. 

“Angela?” 

Warmth. There was warmth beneath her fingertips, accompanied by a gentle, rhythmic thump. There was warmth  _ around _ her fingertips, and, when she refocused on her surroundings, Fareeha’s hand was holding her own. 

_ Alive.  _ The thump, her lover’s heartbeat - Angela realized she had indeed crossed the remaining distance between them to unerringly touch the expanse of skin where she would feel it most - travelled from her fingertips to spread along her arm and then the rest of her.  _ She’s alive. _

_ This time. _ A darker voice grated in her ear. It sounded surprisingly similar to that of her professor.  _ But for how long can you keep her that way?  _

Losing what was left of her composure, Angela broke.

**************

There was something  _ different  _ in the way Angela was looking at her scars. It made Fareeha uncomfortable to linger on what it was, and yet she felt she had to. 

She’d never had a problem stripping in front of Angela, not even back when they’d just been doctor and patient. She was always so professional, so composed, but somehow managed to make everyone feel at ease around her. 

Not today. 

Today Angela stared at her with an expression Fareeha could only call distraught. She lingered one each of her scars with an intensity that made her skin crawl, her eyes filled with a pain that Fareeha didn’t know how to ease.

Her lover must look at the scars differently than she, of that much Fareeha was well aware. For her each scar was a lesson learned, a mistake she would not repeat. Each bullet wound, every gash...they were knowledge hardwired into her muscle memory. Even those that sent chills down her spine, like the furrow a slug had melted above her helmet’s visor. She’d have to tuck her head in better next time she was faced with a similar situation, but Fareeha chose not to dwell on the narrow misses. Alternatives that led to failure were contemplated and analyzed, but ultimately discarded. She had no other choice but to operate that way, or succumb to freezing terror. Now  _ that  _ meant certain death on the battlefield. 

On the other hand, Angela was the one dealing with her learning process, the bleeding and the pain. She was the one who tended to the aftermath, and Fareeha could see how that would take its toll after a while. She saw it now, in the haggard look plastered over Angela’s face, which she was trying, and failing, to disguise. 

She stared, forcing herself to keep still, as Angela reached out, fingers ghosting over her heart. Her lover’s movements were dream-like, and Fareeha wasn’t sure that Angela was fully aware of what she was doing. Her face, her eyes were full of heartbreak, and that was something not even a doctor as skilled as she was could mend. Not in others, and not in herself. 

_ But maybe I can help. _

She wanted to kick herself for having failed to see this coming. Too absorbed in training her men, then in the mission - civil unrest threatening the refugee camps strewn across the Giza Plateau to the point her squad was sent to intervene - Fareeha had failed to spot the red flags. Angela was so dependable and self-reliant that it was easy to forget she was part of Helix Squad as well, and in a way under Fareeha’s direct command, but that was an excuse she refused to hide behind. 

She could, and would do better. 

“Angela?” 

Careful not to startle her, Fareeha wrapped her fingers around Angela’s. The medic’s hand was cool against hers, but just as calloused by hard training. Angela was not soft, she’d never been, but perhaps she’d hardened herself beyond what was advisable. 

Fareeha looked down at her discarded armor and pursed her lips in thought.  _ Perhaps we both have. _

It was time to allow for softness, she decided, for both their sakes. 

“Angela.” She repeated, tugging slightly at her lover’s hand. Startled out of the dark thoughts which circled her like vultures, Angela took an involuntary step forward and gasped. 

“I’m sorry, I- Let me-” She tried to pry her hand away, but Fareeha held fast, if gently. 

“Angela” She whispered, and pulled a bit more insistently this time, her lover almost tumbling into her waiting arms. “I’m here. Alive. See?” 

Grasping Angela’s other hand, she guided both of them to her chest, watching her lover come apart as she traced her skin. Tears hung at the corners of Angela’s eyes before spilling down her cheeks, each muted sob escaping her a clear sign of the struggle she was undergoing with herself. Fareeha saw her try to hold it all back, but she wouldn’t have it. Not when it meant that it’d devour Angela like rot, a gangrene of the heart that would spread, silent and unseen, until she was poisoned to sickness from it. 

Fareeha scooted back on the cot; it was hard and uncomfortable, the metal cold under her rear, but it would do for what she had in mind. Angela was sobbing too hard to resist now, and it was easy for Fareeha to pick her up and settle her into her lap. 

As she did, her gaze went to the armor her lover donned whenever she deployed with the rest of the team. Fareeha had lost count of the times Angela’s shadow had fallen on her or one of the others in the battlefield, when, at once savior and vengeful angel, she descended among them to heal and protect as it was necessary. 

She was not sure whether Angela was aware, but some of the staff called her their guardian angel, and she was, for all of them. 

_ But it’s time someone guarded you, habibti. _

“Lock the door.” 

The A.I. promptly obeyed, the locks engaging with a click that sounded thrice as loud than it was in the quiet of the infirmary. Fareeha knew they had some time before they were called to the command center for debriefing, and she intended to make good use of it. 

“What are you doing?” Angela raised her face from where she’d been hiding it, the tears she’d shed leaving a patch of damp skin on Fareeha’s neck. 

“Showing you just how alive I am.” 

Before Angela could think of a response, Fareeha cupped her cheek and kissed her.

**************

Farehaa’s lips were warm against her own. Soft. 

Angela gasped, lips parting in surprise at first and then in welcome. Fareeha didn’t have to coax her for entrance; she greeted the gentle brush of her lover’s tongue with ardor, the exhale that came with it proof that Fareeha was...alive. 

_ Alive. Warm. Mine. _

“What are you doing?” She repeated, once they broke apart, even if the answer was obvious in the way Fareeha’s hand was slipping down between them. 

Fareeha didn’t reply, kissing her again instead. She tugged at her lower lip, nipping it till it got sore, then, when Angela’s words melted into a moan, sucked on her tongue. 

The fear was still there and it would never truly leave, but with each breath they shared it was pushed back, no longer a black tide of despair, but something Angela could rationalize and manage. 

Fareeha was not only proving that she was indeed alive, but bringing Angela back to life as well. 

Pressure built up between her legs, a coil of desire sitting deep inside her belly, and for a moment, Angela could forget how afraid she’d felt, how bone-deep terrified she’d been that Fareeha would not cross the threshold on her own two legs, but carried inside a shroud. 

It was a perfect moment, on she would have crystallized in amber if she could have, trapping the two of them within it indefinitely. It didn’t last of course - it wasn’t meant to - time rushing back so fast it knocked the breath from her. Fareeha’s touch was making her squirm, and her flailing hand knocked her lover’s helmet on the floor. 

The hollow clank of metal on metal was as ominous as a death knell, and enough to remind her just how much of a close call it had been this time. 

A mere matter of inches. 

“Don’t,” Fareeha grasped her chin, keeping her gaze from the floor, “don’t look at it. Forget about it.” 

“I…” Her lips were trembling bad enough that it was hard to form the words. “I can’t.” 

“Then I will make you.” 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> [follow me on TWITTER for more stories and exclusive content](https://twitter.com/Kendrene17/)
> 
>  
> 
> [or find me on TUMBLR](https://kendrene.tumblr.com/)


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